Page 143 of Trying Sophie

“I know what you need!” Katie exclaimed apropos of nothing. “You need to get laid!”

She raised her hand for a high five, but I left her hanging while I pointedly looked around the pub, my eyes alighting on the four men in the room: an octogenarian with a paunch the size of a keg, a balding man with one leg shorter than the other, my grandfather, and Cian. As a group, they were a pretty good representation of the type of men available in Ballycurra. Since we’d established I hadn’t slept with Cian, nor was I ever going to, that left me with two old dudes. Not exactly inspiring options. I slapped her hand limply, my lack of enthusiasm apparent.

“Oh shit.” She peered at me through slatted eyes. “You’re in love with him.”

“What?!” I screeched.

How had she gotten that out of anything I’d said or done in the last ten minutes.

“You might not know this Sophie, but you’d suck at poker. When I said you needed to get laid, you looked horrified, then your eyes got all misty, like you couldn’t imagine being with anyone ever again,” she explained. “I might have drawn some conclusions of my own, but yeah. It’s right there on your face. You’re in love with Declan.”

“Shh,” I warned. “Everyone here knows him and gossip travels faster than …” When I couldn’t find an apt comparison, I said, “Let’s just say news travels fast around here. If anyone hears you talking about me being in love with Declan, I’m done for.”

In a twist of comical timing, Siobhan walked past and said, “Whoever’s in love with Declan will have to take a number. Half of Dublin would give their left tit to be with him.”

“No one’s in love with Declan!” I bleated, which only made me sound guilty.

“Is that so?” she remarked, cackling as she bussed a table.

I groaned once she was out of ear shot. “Well, there goes that.”

“You never answered me,” Katie interjected like a dog with a bone. “Are you in love with him?”

“I told you, I’m leaving soon. And even if I wasn’t leaving, it hardly matters when he cheated.”

“What did he say when you broke up with him?”

Ugh, not this again.

“I did it over text,” I admitted guiltily. “He said I had it all wrong but I ignored him. Told him goodbye.”

“Did you? Have it all wrong?” she asked, eyeing me speculatively.

Unable to bear up under her scrutiny much longer, I looked away before answering. “Maybe. His sister thinks the girl, Maggie, is lying. I don’t know what to think.” I shrugged and dragged my eyes back to Katie. “It doesn’t matter though because I’m leaving soon and we would have broken up eventually anyhow.”

“Sophie, you don’t know that,” she intoned. “You have to find out the truth. If you love him—really love him—you have to know for sure.”

“It’s too late. He basically told me he hates me and never wants to see me again.”

“Well, make him see you!” she declared. “Like I said, you have to know. He has to know.”

“Oh no,” I argued. “I’m not telling him I love him now. He broke my heart, Katie. Even if he didn’t cheat on me, the things he said later … it was too much. It hurt, bad.”

“I’m going to ask you something and I want you to think before you answer.”

“Okay,” I nodded.

“Do you honestly believe he cheated on you?”

I thought over our time together, from that very first day at the airport until those horrible minutes when Maggie and Annie confronted me with their claims. Declan might have behaved dishonorably toward women in the past, but I knew he’d wanted me for more than sex. Yes, we’d been explosive together, but we were also so much more than that. He made me laugh and I gave him a measure of peace. He’d felt like the missing piece in the puzzle of my life, and I thought I’d been similar for him. I had some experience with how men behaved when they were cheating, and that wasn’t how things were with us. Nothing about our relationship had felt furtive, none of our moments stolen or guilty.

Claire’s warning came back to me for the thousandth time.

I exhaled on a sob. “No.”

“You have to tell him then. He has to know, Sophie. If he finds out you’re in love with him, he might rethink things.”

“I’m surprised you’re so open-minded about the power of love given you just ended a two-year engagement.”

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